Monday, January 23, 2017

HPE agreed to acquire Cloud Cruiser, a start-up specializing in cloud consumption analytics software that enables customers to manage and optimize public, private and hybrid cloud usage and spend. HPE is one of Cloud Cruiser’s largest customers. Financial terms were not disclosed.

HPE said the Cloud Cruiser IT infrastructure consumption analytics application provides clear insight into IT usage and spend and helps customers more effectively plan and manage their IT systems. The company is already a key component of HPE’s Flexible Capacity business as we currently license Cloud Cruiser’s solutions in its Flexible Capacity offering.

Cloud Cruiser was founded in 2010 and is based in San Jose, CA and Roseville, CA.

Aryaka, a start-up offering SD-WAN solutions, completed a $45 million Series D round of financing to support its global expansion.

The company said it has delivered over 100 percent year-over-year growth for five consecutive quarters and now has more than 500 global enterprise customers with sites in 63 countries around the world.

The investment was led by Third Point Ventures, added new investor Deutsche Telekom Capital Partners (DTCP), and included participation from existing investors.

“We are excited about the funding from Third Point Ventures and from DTCP, which is the first telecommunications company to make a major investment in global SD-WAN,” said Shawn Farshchi, President and CEO at Aryaka Networks. “This investment further validates our global SD-WAN technology and sends a signal to the market that Aryaka represents the future of global connectivity.”

Additionally, Aidan Cullen has joined Aryaka’s leadership team as Chief Financial Officer. Aidan is a finance executive and strategic leader with more than 25 years of experience in global technology companies within the software, networking, and telecommunications industries. He has held CFO positions at CliQr Technology (Cisco), Gigamon, Sylantro Systems (Broadsoft), and Tasman Networks (Nortel).http://www.aryaka.com

President Donald J. Trump designated Ajit Pai as his choice to be Chair of the FCC.

Ajit Varadaraj Pai was nominated for FCC Commissioner by President Obama in 2011. Pai took over the seat abandoned by Meredith Baker who left the FCC to take a job as a lobbyist for Comcast. Pai was previously a Partner in the Litigation Department of Jenner & Block LLP. Previously, Pai worked in the Office of the General Counsel at the Federal Communications Commission, where he served as Deputy General Counsel, Associate General Counsel, and Special Advisor to the General Counsel. He holds a B.A. from Harvard University and a J.D. from the University of Chicago.

"I am deeply grateful to the President of the United States for designating me the 34th Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. I look forward to working with the new Administration, my colleagues at the Commission, members of Congress, and the
American public to bring the benefits of the digital age to all Americans," stated Ajit Pai.

Tricentis, which specializes in agile market leading software testing tools for enterprises, announced $165 million in Series B financing from Insight Venture Partners, a leading global private equity and venture capital firm. Tricentis is based in Vienna, Austria and has offices worldwide.

“Today’s predominately manual software testing processes fail to meet the needs of today’s Agile and DevOps initiatives, which require highly-accelerated development cycles and, at the same time, a strict accounting for the business risks associated with rapid, iterative code changes,” said Sandeep Johri, CEO of Tricentis.

RETN, which operates a backbone network that stretches over 32,000 kilometers of fiber and connects 29 countries across Europe, Asia and North America, has deployed the Infinera Cloud Xpress for connectivity between Frankfurt, Munich and Vienna.

The Infinera Cloud Xpress delivers a 500 Gb/s super-channel in a compact, two rack unit appliance for efficient transport of Ethernet services. Cloud Xpress also incorporates Infinera’s Instant Bandwidth technology to allow customers to software-activate line-side bandwidth in 100 Gb/s increments as and when needed, closely matching their end-customer demands.

RETN has been operating Infinera’s Intelligent Transport Networks for several years to enable construction, modernization and upgrade of its DWDM cross-border network ring infrastructure in Europe and Russia, including major transboundary routes across Scandinavia and Ukraine. In 2015, RETN announced deployment of 500 Gb/s super-channels using the Infinera DTN-X packet optical platform across its pan-European network. RETN selected the Infinera Cloud Xpress to provide 100 Gb/s DWDM services on two of its routes in Western Europe.

“RETN is experiencing growth in high-traffic regional networks across Europe,” said Tony O’Sullivan, RETN COO. “RETN prides itself on being an early adopter of new and innovative technologies. As we upgrade our networks, we turn to innovators in the industry bringing new solutions to the market first, like Infinera. We are delighted to have successfully deployed Cloud Xpress to power our regional networks in Western Europe, enabling us to deliver simple, scalable and reliable services for our customers.”

Turbonomic (formerly VMTurbo), which offers an autonomic performance platform for the hybrid cloud, secured an additional $50 million in financing led by General Atlantic, a leading global growth equity firm.

Turbonomic’s autonomic performance platform for the hybrid cloud enables environments to self-manage to assure performance of any application. Turbonomic’s patented autonomic decision engine dynamically matches application demand with infrastructure supply in real time, to maintain environments in a healthy state.

Turbonomic said it is helping customers to manage 2.9 million dynamic workloads in real-time, improving application performance while reducing costs – not only in their on-premises data centers, but also in their public, private, and hybrid clouds – managing both legacy and cloud-native applications.

For the latest funding round, General Atlantic joined existing investors Bain Capital Ventures, Highland Capital, Globespan, and Iconiq. Gary Reiner, former Chief Information Officer of General Electric and current Operating Partner of General Atlantic, will join the company’s Board of Directors.

“General Atlantic is a world-class investment firm, and Gary Reiner is a world-class IT leader and strategist,” said Bill Veghte, Executive Chairman of Turbonomic. “Their investment and participation is a tribute to the progress the company is making and the opportunity in front of us to dramatically improve IT efficiency and experience. We’re thrilled to have Gary on board to help us grow and scale.”